Why do undesirable politicians keep getting re-elected? Several reasons can be cited for this. It could be summed up with the three “I”s: Ignorance, Invincibility and Incestuousness.

Ignorance: Often the voters don’t have a way to evaluate candidates for public office. The incumbent, no matter how unfit he or she is, has a big advantage because governments purchase media advertising and, to keep this revenue stream going, the media is going to side with the incumbent almost every time. That means reporting little or nothing about any challengers and certainly nothing positive about them.

Invincibility: Incumbent politicians have a huge advantage on many levels with the most important advantage being campaign contributions. Since the incumbent is able to “steer” tax money to this or that group or individual for maximum benefit to that incumbent. It’s easy to get people to vote for you if you give them money for doing so. Challengers for public office attract little if anything in the way of campaign contributions. Challengers also do not enjoy the direct media access and news coverage that an incumbent does.

Incestuousness: Incumbent politicians are almost always “in bed” with those they are supposed to regulate and oversee. Often tax money that a politician votes for to fund government agencies is “fed back” to that politician to make sure that certain things happen to benefit the campaign contributor…Or to insure that nothing benefiting the campaign contributor goes away. It’s not much different than the politician writing checks from the State Treasury to him or herself. It’s also using our money to work against us.

This phenomenon has grown to perverse extremes. With the current State of our State (and our Nation) one can get almost anything they want from government if the give enough money to enough politicians. We even have politicians supporting things like secret trials, governments and monopoly utilities maintaining extensive dossiers on persons not suspected of committing crimes and governments and monopoly utilities giving tax money to terrorist groups and criminal organizations.

The progressive side has their solution. Limitations on campaign contributions and/or limitations on campaign spending (illegal under Citizens United), or more teeth in the wall between independent expenditure and candidates, and/or limited public funding of candidates.

Perhaps this is an area that outsiders from all parts of the political spectrum could work on together.

Britt Storkson

There are no limits on campaign contributions. Money can be and is “laundered” through third parties or trade organizations. While this type of money laundering is legal it is not legal when it comes to IRS reporting. We need full disclosure.

3H

“Why do undesirable politicians keep getting re-elected?
There is an unproven assumption here.. undesirable by whom? You? Me? You assume ignorance, etc…, but perhaps they are re-elected because their constituents like them. Maybe it’s not ignorance, et. al., but many of the voters, if not most, are informed enough and make a concious decision.
I would still like to see campaign finance reform, to give lesser know candidates a better chance, but at the end of the day, you have made some large leaps of logic without any supporting evidence.

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3H, a typical DNC shlep…

thevillageidiot

A NBC/WSJ poll congressional disapproval as posted in the Huffington Post “According to the survey, 83 percent
of Americans disapprove of the job Congress is doing in Washington, an
all-time high in the poll. Just 12 percent approve of Congress’ job,
while 57 percent they would replace every member of Congress if they
could.”
The best answer is that the wrong question is posed to the wrong people. in my opinion the real consensus is that “my congressman is doing a great job and all the rest need to be replaced.”

according to statistics presented by opensecrets.org between 85% and 98% (1964 to 21012) congressmen get reelected and the last election cycle was 90% when congressional disapproval was nearly what it is today. Therefore my congressman is great it is all the others. People believe the smear campaigns and the incumbents who tell everyone I have done everything you wanted, I have been your best representative. Just like Kurt Schrader who sat in his office undecided waiting for someone from the white house to recognize him, hold his hand and tell him to vote for Obummercare. And the ignorant reelected him because his opponent was going to take away the Social security and medicare from the retirees (old folks). and it has worked. never mind the fact that he had the best funded campaign in Oregon from the DNC for all of his elections because his seat is considered one that could go either way. and it almost did in the last election.

Britt Storkson

What do you need for supporting evidence?

JackLordGod

The assessment here is basically true, however the title “bad politicians” is not true. Bad is in the eye of the beholder. For government workers, politicians steering money into their hands might be bad for the taxpayer, but are good for them.

The true dark side of this equation is there are no solutions. We have grown an effective constituency for government largess that is very hard to defeat in an election.

Just in Oregon we have a staggering number of people who are either government employees, retired from government, or who live with a family member in one of these two groups.

Nationally vast swaths of the population have suddenly become disabled and receive disability checks. Half the households have someone living in them who receives direct government benefits.

So the answer is, these “bad politicians” will likely grow in number. We are at the point where Americans have discovered they can vote themselves money and are voting for politicians who will do exactly that.

Will it change? A few years ago I would have thought it possible. I simply thought it impossible that parents would have put up with school becoming a complete joke, with endless “in service” days, and five day school weeks becoming a rarity. That didn’t happen. Parents seem totally content that a fortune is spent on schools with little to show for it. Kids staying home, not learning, while the bloated bureaucracy thrives and grows is the most direct impact on a substantial portion of Oregonians lives I can really imagine. Yet it seems to have no effect.

At some point you have to realize that the populace has been corrupted, that so many are dependent on hand outs and looking for more, that they don’t want things turned around. Looking for a new hand out, a new government program has become the industry of Americans, not creating jobs or limiting government. That day is at hand. Sloth has triumphed over diligence. Ignorance is the rule of the day. Miley Cyrus is all that matters to most.

DavidAppell

Just in Oregon we have a staggering number of people who are either government employees, retired from government, or who live with a family member in one of these two groups.

What is this number?
How is it bigger than in other states?

kneejerkor

It is because voters learn to dislike the politicians they have elected and every
cycle try to “throw the bums out.” But, in a “2-party system,” doing
that merely reinstates the previous set of bums. The solution is to elect candidates who are not Ds or Rs.

T. Partee

Concur!

WashCoIndependents.com

Unless the process is reformed, this will be very difficult. So reformers need to focus on process. From whatever part of the political spectrum, reforming the process is the only way to obtain substantial change. Then, we can all go back to arguing with each other over policy.

Turnaround

Here are the solutions – independent redistricting of political boundaries, changing primary system so NAV can participate, and limiting political donations to indviduals (no unions or corporations)

oregongrown

Here in Oregon the government sector, which has reached a critical
mass of people, add the thousands and thousands of PERS retirees, then add that to the welfare contingent which is growing to heights never imagined, and that voting block is voting their meal ticket. They don’t want change. They don’t care if they bankrupt the rest of us.

In Time Magazine report, Broken City: Detroit,( Aug 5th, 2013), Portland, OR is mentioned (again) as having way too much pension debt. But are any our leaders up for that challenge to buck the govt unions, or the big government mentality? Not even close.

Let’s add up what Kitzhaber has done about PERS, now in his third term.

DavidAppell

The PERS retirees negotiated a contract, right?
Now Oregon taxpayers want out of that contract because, after the fact, they don’t like it.
What other contracts that you’ve signed do you consider breakable?

unsigned to any bs contract

The sun rises and sets. The contract is unsustainable and DA as usual, waxes OBAMANable.

unsigned…

or OBAMAnipple.

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In retrospect, might the process have been initiated with with SEATO, Mr Appell cede?